Controversy Over Joy of the Gospel Encyclical

Judge Napolitano wrote an essay criticizing the controversial Papal teaching document Joy of the Gospel, even saying it "seems... Marxist":

His encyclical, entitled “Joy of the Gospel,” attacks free market capitalism because it takes too long for the poor to get rich. “They are still waiting,” the Pope wrote. Well, without capitalism, which rewards hard work and sacrifice, they will wait forever. No economic system in history has alleviated more poverty, generated more opportunity and had more formerly poor people become rich than capitalism.

Sigh.  Capitalism and free markets are mutually exclusive. Napolitano conflates the two where the Pope does not say any such thing.  At no point does the Pope mention "free market capitalism." In fact, no where in the document does the word capitalism or capitalist appear. Or Marxist.  Napolitano has set up a straw man.

Here is what the Pope actually says, the only reference to the free market in the long document:

54. In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.

Although Andrew Napolitano is an exceptionally bright judge who made it to State Superior Court level, he really ought to approach what a Pope says with some humility.  The operative word in #54 is "theories" regarding economic growth, in which a free market plays literally a parenthetical role.  The Pope clearly keeps the "trickle-down theories" and free markets as separate things. It seems the Pope knows the difference between the free market and supply-side Chicago school economics. And just who has Judge Napolitano been criticizing his entire celebrity career other than the selfsame "those wielding economic power"?  Anyone reading the Pope's source document can comprehend what the Pope actually said. Napolitano's criticism is flat out dishonest.

And Napolitano's "alleviated more poverty..." spiel is nonsense in two ways:

1.  Capitalism has 3,482 definitions right now, so which one does he credit with all those good things? (The Pope appears to be targeting the Chicago school, or more specifically, supply-side economics.)

2. A free market is free from force and fraud, free to contract.  In every one of the 3,482 definitions of capitalism, usury is permitted, which is both force and fraud.  So free markets and capitalism are mutually exclusive.

Napolitano dishonestly attributes benefits that arise only from free markets to capitalism, by conflating free markets and capitalism, in support of a theory, as the Pope says, which has never been confirmed by the facts.   Yes, we've seen some good things, but because of free markets, and in spite of capitalism.  The Soviet Union got more food from the personal garden lots allowed than from the collectivist farms. So we saw the same thing under communism.

I have not finished reading the document, but it has solid arguments:

202. The need to resolve the structural causes of poverty cannot be delayed, not only for the pragmatic reason of its urgency for the good order of society, but because society needs to be cured of a sickness which is weakening and frustrating it, and which can only lead to new crises. Welfare projects, which meet certain urgent needs, should be considered merely temporary responses. As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation and by attacking the structural causes of inequality,[173]no solution will be found for the world’s problems or, for that matter, to any problems. Inequality is the root of social ills.

What is he saying?  Welfare projects should be temporary?  Spot on! What is a big problem we have?  Welfare projects are multigenerational, and destroy whole cities.   "Absolute autonomy of the markets and financial speculation" is a problem?  This is news?  To whom does one imagine the Pope is referring?  The 15 year old American of some African heritage who is braiding hair without a license?  Is that the "autonomy of the markets (ie, free market)" that keeps the Pope awake at night? Or the "regulated" worldwide who have captured the regulators: big finance, big medicine, big agri, who answer to absolutely no one and ruin economies plus bring on follow-on military action.   We vote against bail-outs and get bail-outs.  We vote against stadiums and get stadiums.  We vote against war and get war.  And then the lawless have the temerity to label their work "free markets" so their victims are confounded as to where liberation might be.  The bad guys fear free markets most of all.  The Pope is criticizing the lawless powers over the Tunisian (now overthrown) government that beat up the fruit seller, not the fruit seller.  The most revolutionary act a human being can make today is to start a business.

(Also Napolitano slams the Pope for saying youth unemployment is a top crisis...

"It's a throwaway culture that discards young people as well as its older people. In some European countries, without mentioning names, there is youth unemployment of 40 percent and higher," he added. "A whole generation of young people does not have the dignity that is brought by work."

I think the Pope has that about right...  And with the push for $15/hr min wage, we can expect a whole lot more youth unemployment.)

I welcome anyone who might read the Pope's letter and find something controversial to cite it and send it in to me to respond.  You have nothing better to read or watch.  This Pope is changing things, and it is can be a very useful source of discussion and ideas.  Here is a .pdf of the document.  it's 225 pages as a .pdf, but if you copy and paste the HTML into a WP doc, then strip out the citations and table of contents, reduce it to 12 point, narrow the  the margins, etc, it gets down to 60 pages...  I await your critiques...

Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.

Bookmark this post --- Email this post